DEALBOOK; Amylin Is Said to Be Looking for a Suitor

By MICHAEL J. DE LA MERCED

Published: April 23, 2012

Amylin Pharmaceuticals is seeking a potential buyer, after it rebuffed an unsolicited $3.5 billion takeover offer from Bristol-Myers Squibb earlier this year, a person briefed on the matter said Sunday.

Amylin, the maker of diabetes drugs, is working with Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs and the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, this person said, adding that no sale was imminent.

The move by Amylin, which has attracted attention for its diabetes drugs Bydureon and Byetta, comes as the company is under pressure from the activist investor Carl C. Icahn. Mr. Icahn has urged Amylin to seek a buyer and has threatened to run a proxy fight.

Setting these efforts in motion was Bristol-Myers's bid of $22 a share in February, people briefed on the matter said previously. Amylin deemed the offer too low, though the company's stock had remained below the price until news of the bid emerged in news reports over recent weeks.

Several drug makers are likely to consider making a bid for Amylin to buy its pipeline, according to analysts. The company's fortunes were lifted considerably in January, after the Food and Drug Administrationfinally signed off on Bydureon, a treatment for Type 2 diabetes that is injected once a week. It is a refinement of Byetta, which was introduced in 2005 and requires twice-daily injections.

Bydureon had been twice denied approval because of concerns of side effects like heart rate abnormalities.

The drug has some strings attached, however. Chief among them is that Amylin must pay Eli Lilly, its former partner, $1.2 billion from sales of the product over time.

Still, analysts regard it as a potential breakthrough product for Amylin, which has posted annual losses for more than two decades.

Representatives for Amylin and its advisers were not immediately available for comment.

News of Amylin's sales efforts was reported earlier by Reuters.

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.